Does Bio Sons diagnosis affect chances of adopting.

I have always dreamt of adopting and made sure to marry a man that was open to adoption some day. We are a young military family with 2 young boys and after his deployment this year I would really love to become foster parents and eventually adopt a child through foster care. I am wondering if the fact that my almost 4 year old is Autistic will affect our chances and if we are out of the running as far as foster care. He is incredibly high functioning, bright, and happy he just has some delays that he has mostly caught up on in the last 2 years with alot of hard work and therapies.

I prefer foster adoption but if thats off the table then I would look into domestic I just feel drawn to helping a child in need.

Comments (9)

I don't think it would disqualify you. Plenty of couples adopt children with autism and go on to adopt more children. I think it would actually help you because you are already knowledgable about autism.

I'm glad to hear it I just didn't want them to think we weren't able to handle another child but we are more than capable of taking care of more kids and being one of 5 kids myself I am used to it lol.

It shouldn't make a difference at all. I would say that the only way having a child with any disability would affect your ability to foster would be if the child was extremely violent and would be a safety concern for the other children.

My oldest has mild autism and it didn't cause any issues with fostering/pending adoption of my younger two, though they are a kinship adoption so it could be a little different but I doubt it.

Our bio son has Autsim too, more like Aspergers. This did not stop our plan to adopt a child from the foster care system. The social workers thought we handled our son and his needs wonderfully. So, much so, we were matched super quickly with a little girl who had some developmental delays. They knew that going to drs. appointments, and therapies was something we had done and were willing to do. That little girl could not walk and barely talked when she came home. Two years later she is running, climbing and her speech is progressing nicely. She was diagnosed with Autism last year. It is much easier the second time around.

our five year old has language processing disorder. our knowledge of the services available in our city has offered our social worker confidence that we will make sure our daughter gets the services she may need.
i'm sure this won't affect you negatively at all.